Radiation Treatment

Mint's housebreaking is coming along pretty well.
But we have to leave the door to the backyard open, so we have had some problems. We put a pad out in the back so he can do his business there and get in the habit of going outside. But, there have been a lot of accidents too, because we had left the door closed.

Yesterday, we went to Kaiser on Sunset because Hajime had an appointment at the hospital, and this time we went to the radiation department. Hajime has been getting Botox injections once every three months because he produces a great deal of saliva, but they say that from now on, he will not need to have those painful injections anymore. We went because the doctor had recommended that Hajime have a procedure to decrease his saliva production with radiation.

If they do the radiation treatment and everything goes well, he will no longer produce saliva. The results vary from patient to patient, but they think it may be effective for Hajime. They will do the treatment around his cheek area, and the whole procedure will be done in about an hour. I have some concerns because they will use radiation, but one side effect is that because his saliva production will be stopped, he will get dry mouth.
And, depending on where they target the radiation, he may lose the tufts of hair under his temples...

I understand that, normally, they do this procedure only after taking a CT scan and they see the patient over many visits, but since Hajime cannot do all that, they will start the radiation treatment without doing the CT scan.
We made an appointment right away, so we will have the procedure done next Wednesday afternoon. Hajime has given us his consent. I hope everything goes well.

These past few weeks, Hajime has had to use the wheelchair about once a week on average. We have gotten quite used to maneuvering the wheelchair too.
But, it takes great skill to put Hajime in the wheelchair since he has no muscles left in his whole body. It's very important that I not let Hajime see how hard it is for me. I don't want to burden him with any unnecessary worries...
So, I will have to do my best next week too!


(translated by MS)